Articulations in mammals including humans are mechanically stimulated during their physical activities and exposed to risks such as inflammation and physical destruction. Examples of factors of causing disorders in articulations (hereinafter, briefly called “articular disorders”) are infections, injuries, allergies, metabolic disorders, corpulences, and blood circulation disorders. It has been pointed out that the crisis rate of articular disorders increases as aging, and articular disorders are becoming to be a social problem in this aging society.
As articular disorders generally accompany inflammations, they are treated with anti-inflammatories in many cases. However, treatments thereof can be only effective for temporarily suppressing some symptoms accompanied by articular disorders such as pains and swellings. There is nothing but the action of recovery by living bodies to intrinsically cure the disorders.
The specification of Japanese Patent No. 2,971,579 discloses a composition comprising an effective amount of an amino sugar or a salt thereof, and a glycosaminoglycan or a salt thereof for treating damaged connective tissues and arthritis or for keeping treated conditions. The composition promotes the recovery action of living bodies on damaged connective tissues through the functions of amino sugars and glycosaminoglycans. It may be as a proposal to solve the problem of current treatments with anti-inflammatories. However, the establishment of more effective agents for treating articular disorders, which use the above functions of amino sugars and glycosaminoglycans, has been desired to solve the problem of articular disorders becoming to be a social problem. In addition, these amino sugars and glycosaminoglycans may give some people a strange taste and flavor when taken orally, and therefore, it has been greatly expected that agents for treating articular disorders should be improved in their taste and flavor although it contains amino sugars and glycosaminoglycans.